The Canadian government has announced that it will be hiking wages for essential workers across the country who have been on the front line of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“If you are risking your health to keep this country moving and you’re making minimum wage, you deserve a raise,” Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced this week, making good on a promise to increase salaries.

Trudeau’s government will spend more than $3 billion to raise wages for essential workers making less than about $1,800 a month.

When we think of the symptoms of coronavirus, we think of the lungs – people on ventilators or with nasty coughs, struggling to breathe. That’s because a COVID-19 positive patient often presents with fever, persistent cough, muscle pain and fatigue.

But the molecule that the virus attacks in our bodies – Angiotensin Converting Enzyme 2 or ACE2 – is present not just in our lungs, but also in our gastrointestinal tract, potentially leading to symptoms such as diarrhea, nausea and vomiting.

While COVID-19 is dominating headlines, another kind of emergency is threatening the lives of millions of people around the world: food insecurity.

“The two are very much intertwined, however. By the end of 2020, authorities estimate that upwards of 265 million people could be on the brink of starvation globally, almost double the current rate of crisis-level food insecurity,” writes Imam Ghosh for Visual Capitalist.

Elias Hakizimana

Elias Hakizimana, CEO&Founder of The Inspirer Ltd,(www.rwandainspirer.com) is a professional Rwandan Journalist with Bachelor’s Degree in Journalism and Communication, received from University of Rwanda’s College of Arts and Social Sciences (CASS) in 2014. He served various media houses in Rwanda including Rwanda Broadcasting Agency (RBA) in 2013 and became passionate with English Online and Print Media Publications where he exercised his talent as a Freelance News Reporter for The New Times, The Independent, The Rwanda Focus, Panorama and more before he became a Self-Entrepreneur as the CEO and Founder of The Inspirer Limited in early 2017.